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I wonder if the company that made that cladding even bothered testing it or if they tested it and knew it was flammable. Either way they should be held accountable. Like it should no longer exist and the people in charge should go to prison.

What a horrific story. The Guardian feed suggests that some people high up in the building managed to survive by putting wet towels down at the base of the doors.

__________________"The thief and the murderer follow nature just as much as the philanthropist. Cosmic evolution may teach us how the good and the evil tendencies of man may have come about; but, in itself, it is incompetent to furnish any better reason why what we call good is preferable to what we call evil than we had before."

I wonder if the company that made that cladding even bothered testing it or if they tested it and knew it was flammable. Either way they should be held accountable. Like it should no longer exist and the people in charge should go to prison.

Just what I was going to say. When these buildings went up there weren't the quality controls we see today but ever since that time someone has been responsible for it, and whoever that is needs to be accountable.

__________________"I don't think I'm getting the most out of my computer. I turn it on... and use it as a light." - Harry Hill

Just what I was going to say. When these buildings went up there weren't the quality controls we see today but ever since that time someone has been responsible for it, and whoever that is needs to be accountable.

The cladding that appears to have been responsible for the fire spreading was put on last year.

So flammable materials, no working fire alarm, no working sprinklers and no tested evacuation procedure. If this is proven then people need to charged with manslaughter and go to jail for a long time. Some of these property companies have no regard for anything but raking in the cash.

__________________"I don't think I'm getting the most out of my computer. I turn it on... and use it as a light." - Harry Hill

"It was obvious that it wasn't quite right how quickly the fire propagated and moved up the floors within minutes," Mr Wong said, adding that he would be attending a meeting hosted by the City of Melbourne on Monday afternoon.

MFB chief fire officer Peter Rau said the building's external cladding, Alucobest, had undergone scientific testing and was found in breach of combustibility requirements for a high-rise building.

"The external cladding material on this building did not prevent the spread of the fire, as required by the building code," Mr Rau said.

LU Simon managing director Peter Devitt said aluminium composite panels including Alucobest had been widely used in Australia for decades. He said the cladding complied with Australian standard tests for ignitability, spread of flame, heat and smoke.

But in 2010, when the building was commissioned, there was no such product that passed the test for "combustibility", he said.

Ben Hardwick, of law firm Slater and Gordon, said legal action potentially worth tens of millions had been on hold awaiting the outcome of the MFB investigation.

"Owners and residents of this building are rightly asking how an occupancy permit was ever issued for this building," he said.

"They now face the prospect of not only having to deal with the fall out of the fire but will be faced with costly rectification works to replace the external walls to the building."

He said whoever was responsible for issuing the occupancy permit in 2012 would "certainly have a number of questions to answer".

Fortunately this building had sprinklers.

__________________Continually pushing the boundaries of mediocrity.
Everything is possible, but not everything is probable.
For if a man pretend to me that God hath spoken to him supernaturally, and immediately, and I make doubt of it, I cannot easily perceive what argument he can produce to oblige me to believe it. Hobbes

If you have to traverse 20 floors of a smoke-filled stairwell, you would not have made it anyway.

The Stairwells are supposed to be designed to limit the amount of smoke that can get into them and to vent what does to prevent exactly this issue.

__________________It must be fun to lead a life completely unburdened by reality. -- JayUtahI am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. -- Charles Babbage (1791-1871)

Certainly supposed to, in fact multiple ones according to the codes, and a sprinkler system. That people are trapped and that the fire was able to take control of so much of the building so rapidly questions exactly how well these were implemented in this case.

It appears that there isn't a regulation for a tower of this size to have sprinklers, even after a renovation:

So flammable materials, no working fire alarm, no working sprinklers and no tested evacuation procedure. If this is proven then people need to charged with manslaughter and go to jail for a long time. Some of these property companies have no regard for anything but raking in the cash.

And only one stairwell.

__________________"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."

The Stairwells are supposed to be designed to limit the amount of smoke that can get into them and to vent what does to prevent exactly this issue.

This is already in the Wiki article on the fire.

Quote:

Past incidents noted by the Grenfell Action Group included a fire in the Adair block in October 2015, at which they stated the London Fire Brigade concluded the management company had not safeguarded residents properly and had issued an Enforcement Order to improve fire safety in the escape staircases and fire doors. A further Fire Brigade audit of the nearby Hazelwood block, also managed by the same company (which had previously suffered a fire with a fatality), also identified fire-related issues and resulted in a further Enforcement Order. The Action Group stated that in the Hazelwood fire, one factor was that stairwell air grilles allowed fire and smoke to spread rapidly and should be closed off;

__________________"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."

__________________"Structural Engineering is the art of molding materials we do not wholly understand into shapes we cannot precisely analyze so as to understand forces we cannot really assess in such a way that the community at large has no reason to suspect the extent of our own ignorance." James E Amrhein

Their argument, that it would be a burden upon landlords and discourage people from renting out homes, is of no comfort to the tenants living in Rachmanesque conditions with pest infestations, damp and mould.

Perhaps, if homes aren’t fit for human habitation, they shouldn’t be let out to humans for habitation?

__________________"Your deepest pools, like your deepest politicians and philosophers, often turn out more shallow than expected." Walter Scott.

(fire expert Sam )Webb surveyed hundreds of residential tower blocks across the country in the early 1990s and presented a damning report to the Home Office, which revealed that more than half of the buildings didn’t meet basic fire safety standards.

__________________"Your deepest pools, like your deepest politicians and philosophers, often turn out more shallow than expected." Walter Scott.

Much as I enjoy reams of poorly informed opinions unsupported by facts at this early stage, there are a wide range of potential shortcomings which might have contributed to the tragic events of the last 24 hours. There may indeed be compliance issues around the Building Regulations, but detail design and workmanship will doubtless come to the fore.

Until we know more, probably during the inevitable public inquiry, I am not at all sure that we should place too much weight on the majority of the talking heads currently appearing in the media.

__________________When the men elected to make laws are but a small part of a foreign parliament, that is when all healthy national feeling dies.

Whilst, as someone who practices in Scotland, I have some concerns about certain aspects of the English Building Regulations (combustability of escape stairs, for example) however it would be unfair to suggest that they are not appropriately rigorous or enforced at statutory consent stage.

As an expert witness, I have to say that workmanship and a failure to adequately inspect or check work on-site have to be the focus in very many cases. The move towards what is effectively self-certification and monitoring in a competitive market place does nothing to help.

We have one project out of all our portfilio where the (public sector) client was willing to appoint a clerk of works. That's not good.

__________________When the men elected to make laws are but a small part of a foreign parliament, that is when all healthy national feeling dies.

Looking at the floorplan, I think a single stairwell would have been fine... as long as it was actually fire-rated, and properly closed off from the rest of the structure.

Things like ventilating to/from the stairwell, not having fire doors, and not having heat/flame-resistant barrier elements in the structure between the stairwell and the rest of the building, all make the stairwell an inadequate fire escape. Adding those elements would have probably saved as many lives as could be saved from the building, in this scenario.

Eye witness on BBC News says he was there very early on - at the same time as the Fire Brigade arrived - went inside the building to rescue people, and he heard no fire alarms, and saw only seven people escape. He thinks that many, many people will have been trapped.

Someone said the building is designed so that the alarm only goes off on the floor of the fire.

Personally, I am sceptical the fire was caused by a fridge freezer, causing it to spread so rapidly.

Some say it was to do with the aluminium cladding, others say the cladding was of wood.

It proves that persons living within this social housing were expected to put up with shoddy standards, in the middle of the UK's richest borough.

__________________If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty. ~ Japanese Proverb

Much as I enjoy reams of poorly informed opinions unsupported by facts at this early stage, there are a wide range of potential shortcomings which might have contributed to the tragic events of the last 24 hours. There may indeed be compliance issues around the Building Regulations, but detail design and workmanship will doubtless come to the fore.

Until we know more, probably during the inevitable public inquiry, I am not at all sure that we should place too much weight on the majority of the talking heads currently appearing in the media.

The company who handled the renovation, Rydon, quickly put out a statement strongly confirming it was fully compliant.

A big concern is why complaints about fire hazards were ignored.

__________________If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty. ~ Japanese Proverb

Whilst, as someone who practices in Scotland, I have some concerns about certain aspects of the English Building Regulations (combustability of escape stairs, for example) however it would be unfair to suggest that they are not appropriately rigorous or enforced at statutory consent stage.

As an expert witness, I have to say that workmanship and a failure to adequately inspect or check work on-site have to be the focus in very many cases. The move towards what is effectively self-certification and monitoring in a competitive market place does nothing to help.

We have one project out of all our portfilio where the (public sector) client was willing to appoint a clerk of works. That's not good.

Even if work was skimped, it seems NOBODY envisaged that the fire would spread so rapidly to all floors.

What is your opinion as to how this could have happened?

__________________If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty. ~ Japanese Proverb

Whilst, as someone who practices in Scotland, I have some concerns about certain aspects of the English Building Regulations (combustability of escape stairs, for example) however it would be unfair to suggest that they are not appropriately rigorous or enforced at statutory consent stage.

As an expert witness, I have to say that workmanship and a failure to adequately inspect or check work on-site have to be the focus in very many cases. The move towards what is effectively self-certification and monitoring in a competitive market place does nothing to help.

We have one project out of all our portfilio where the (public sector) client was willing to appoint a clerk of works. That's not good.

It's still early, so some of the problems I've read and heard on the news may end up being incorrect, but taken as a whole I'm disturbed. So far, these are the deficiencies I've heard of:

No sprinklers.

No fire alarm.

Stairwell lacked functioning smoke dampers and as a result the stairwells were extremely difficult to use and even spread smoke to otherwise unaffected portions of the building.

Exterior cladding was flammable.

Posted instructions in the building said to hunker down in place in case of fire rather than evacuate.

During recent renovation, the building only had one means of egress.

Here in the USA, I might believe that one of those would sneak through the special inspectors, code officials and the Architect's CA rep. But not that many. Our fire marshals conduct regular inspections of building and check and make sure the fire safety standards are being met. The lack of fire alarm, and the inappropriate instructions in case of a fire would be noticed immediately.

The last project I worked on had four different organizations conducting inspections during construction and before occupancy: the city, the architect, the owner and the bank. Sometimes there was even a fifth, such as the insurer for the roof.

I honestly don't understand how a recently renovated building could be this bad.

__________________"Structural Engineering is the art of molding materials we do not wholly understand into shapes we cannot precisely analyze so as to understand forces we cannot really assess in such a way that the community at large has no reason to suspect the extent of our own ignorance." James E Amrhein

Some reports say that the alarm was raised so quickly because Muslims were up late (it being Ramadan and they have to wait until after sunset to eat and drink) and not asleep like many other residents.

I have an aunt who lives in the borough - like many others, she and her family have been donating food, water and clothes to the homeless today.

The number of confirmed fatalities is now 12, but many more are still missing.

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